How 'bout dem Buccos?!!!

If you have been following professional baseball at all this year, you have probably heard the fantastic story of the "Battlin' Bucs" from Pittsburgh, but for Pittsburghers and lifelong Pirates fans this season has been a fairy tale. Still, many are reluctant to hop on the Bucco train due to the epic collapses of the last two seasons.

Entering the month of August, the Pirates had the best record in all of Major League Baseball at 65-42. The Pirates won four games in a row against division foe the St. Louis Cardinals. The Pirates have since raised their record to 67-44 tying a season high 23 games over .500 (the measure of a winning/losing season) and with a win percentage of of 60 percent. With a Cardinals loss Monday night, the Pirates moved two games clear in the National League Central Division.

The reluctance to get behind the Pirates this season stems from years of futility and epic collapses which have plagued the Pirates the past two seasons. In both 2011 and 2012, the Pirates dangled the carrot of a winning season in front of diehard fans only to viciously pull it away in the final months of the season. But with the Pirates fielding the best record in all of baseball this deep into the season the city of Pittsburgh is beginning to believe. It would take an absolutely monumental collapse in the final 2 months of the season for the Pirates to not at least break their 20-season streak of losing seasons. But the play of this year's team has raised expectations and many experts picking the Bucs to make the post-season for the first time since 1992 (also the last season the Pirates finished with a winning record). ESPN metrics give the Pirates a 98.6 percent chance of making the playoffs.